Larry King: "CNN Stopped Doing News A Long Time Ago"

Ex-longtime CNN talk show host Larry King dropped a bomb on his former network of 25 years, telling Russian state-owned RT America that "CNN stopped doing news a long time ago."

King's comments came just one day before CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta engaged in a verbal altercation with President Trump over a northbound Central American migrant caravan - batting a young White House aide's arm away as he refused to relinquish the microphone.

"You know, CNN should be ashamed of itself having you working for them. You are a rude, terrible person," said President Trump. "You shouldn't be working for CNN," adding "The way you treat Sarah Huckabee is horrible."

Acosta's White House credentials were pulled later that evening. White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said:

"President Trump believes in a free press and expects and welcomes tough questions of him and his Administration. We will, however, never tolerate a reporter placing his hands on a young woman just trying to do her job as a White House intern...

This conduct is absolutely unacceptable. It is also completely disrespectful to the reporter’s colleagues not to allow them an opportunity to ask a question. President Trump has given the press more access than any President in history. "

I’ve just been denied entrance to the WH. Secret Service just informed me I cannot enter the WH grounds for my 8pm hit

1) This isn't one incident of rudeness. This is a history of Acosta acting like a complete jackass. Shoving an intern away so he could continue on his rant against the President during a long press conference is just the straw that broke the camels back. Do I need to recap? Lets. https://t.co/wYdEuoMyLT

2) Acosta making a royal ass of himself during the signing of an agreement between Kim Jong Un and President Trump to help bring about denuclearization. REPEATED shouting of questions at inappropriate times. https://t.co/4xVb5j9F0F

4) There was the time he was asking @nikkihaley and @SecPompeo if there had been any discussions about removing President Trump via the 25th amendment, because who the fuck cares about appropriate questions? https://t.co/eTJVppEGFe

HOST RICK SANCHEZ: You know it’s interesting. As I listen to you I’m thinking that both you and I are old enough to remember that there was a lot of antagonism during the 1960s. There was a lot of antagonism during Watergate. There was certainly antagonism during the Clinton years. But there is something, maybe it’s an undercurrent, that is different now. Can you put your finger on it? What is it?

KING: Two things, Rick — the internet and cable news. Could you imagine cable news in Watergate? And they don’t do news anymore. In fact, RT is one of the few channels doing news. RT does news. CNN stopped doing news a long time ago. They do Trump. Fox is Trump TV and MSNBC is anti-Trump all the time. You don’t see a story — there was vicious winds and storms in the Northeast the other day – not covered on any of the three cable networks, not covered. Not covered! So when CNN started covering Trump — they were the first — they covered every speech he made and then they made Trump the story. So, Trump is the story in America. I would bet that ninety-eight percent of all Americans mention his name at least once a day. And when it’s come to that, when you focus on one man, I know Donald 40 years — I know the good side of Donald and I know the bad side of Donald — I think he would like to be a dictator. I think he would love to be able to just run things. So, he causes a lot of this. Then his fight with the media and fake news. I’ve been in the media a long time, like you — longer than you, Rick. And at all my years at CNN, in my years at Mutual Radio, I have never seen a conversation where a producer said to a host “pitch the story this way. Angle it that way. Don’t tell the truth.” Never saw it. Never saw it.

SANCHEZ: You know it’s funny, just quick because you know these producers are telling me you guys have to start wrapping this up … you said something interesting about how CNN played along with Trump. I think they only played along or at least gave him that much airtime in many ways because they didn’t think he was going to win, correct?

KING: I guess it’s to their regret. But, they covered him as a character. They carried every speech he made. They carried him more than Fox News, at the beginning. And so they built the whole thing up and the Republicans had a lot of candidates and they all had weaknesses. When I saw Senator Cruz hug Donald Trump the other day I said, “this is what America has become.” He said that Cruz’s father helped kill Kennedy!